By John Denton
Dec. 2, 2016
PHILADELPHIA – Many a person has left Memphis’ Beale Street – the famed boulevard of blues, booze and BBQ – saddled with the kind of throbbing hangover that they still regret 24 hours later.
The Orlando Magic were in a similarly sloppy state on Friday after coming apart at the seams a night earlier at FedEx Forum, the home arena of the Memphis Grizzlies and a block away from Beale Street.
Whatever lingering pain they were feeling following the Memphis meltdown, the Magic disregarded it and found the perfect antidote to their hangover on Friday in Philadelphia: Stellar ball movement and their best outside shooting performance of the season.
Orlando came into Friday last in the NBA in 3-point shooting, but it connected on a season-best 13 3-point shots for a feel-good 105-88 defeat of the 76ers.
``We felt that we should have won last game, but it didn’t happen like that and that’s how basketball is when the ball doesn’t bounce your way. But we wanted to come out here and continue our road trip and continue to be road warriors,’’ said Magic forward Aaron Gordon, who scored a season-high 20 points and drilled two 3-pointers. ``We have talented players and a good coaching staff and when you put that together we’re going to start clicking. When it does (start clicking), mental toughness is something that we’re going to have (to prevent losses like Thursday’s).’’
The Magic (8-12) put to rest the bitter memory of the Thursday’s loss with their second victory in the past three games. Also, they beat perpetually rebuilding Philadelphia (4-15) for a second time on the season by getting contributions from all over the roster.
``I thought we played well (Thursday) night, but we just didn’t close the game out,’’ Magic coach Frank Vogel said. ``It’s tough to lose a game the way we did (Thursday) night, there’s no other way to look at it. I’ve seen it go a lot of different ways when you’re still feeling disjointed a little bit. But we talk about togetherness all the time and nobody felt good about how that game went. So, they banded together and we got a good win.’’
Vogel didn’t overreact after the gut-wrenching loss from a night earlier, cancelling the usual team meeting and giving his squad the morning off to rest up. The Magic changed time zones from Memphis to Philadelphia and didn’t get to their hotel until 3:15 AM early Friday morning.
``He could have panicked, but he let us sleep in after we got in pretty late last night,’’ said Magic guard D.J. Augustin, who drilled three third-quarter 3-pointers to help the Magic turn a close game into a rout. ``That gave us a chance to rejuvenate ourselves and clear our minds and get ready for the game (Friday night).’’
Orlando shot 47.4 percent from the floor and connected on 50 percent of its 26 3-point shots. It held Philadelphia to 37.9 percent shooting.
Seven of the nine Magic players who got the majority of the minutes hit at least one 3-pointer. Orlando topped its previous season high of 11 3-pointers made on Nov. 13 in Oklahoma City.
Gordon had Orlando’s first basket of the night on a 3-pointer to start the outside onslaught. Jeff Green (16 points), Nikola Vucevic (12 points and 11 rebounds) and Jodie Meeks (nine points in 17 minutes) all made two 3-pointers. Serge Ibaka (16 points) and Evan Fournier (16 points) also connected from beyond the 3-point line.
Meeks, who missed all of training camp, the exhibition season and the first 19 games of the season because of a fractured right foot, made his season debut on Friday. Just his presence and his threat as an elite 3-point shooter – he’s made better than 40 percent from beyond the arc five times – might have had something to do with the Magic’s stellar outside shooting. He made two of his three 3-point attempts.
``It’s always good when your first shot goes down, but I wasn’t too worried about how I was going to play tonight,’’ said Meeks, who has had three surgeries in less than a year to repair the broken bone in the outside of his right foot. ``The main thing for us was (making up for) last night because we felt like we let one get away. Our main focus was to come out and play hard and make the game fun.’’
Joel Embiid, the Eastern Conference’s Rookie of the Month for October, had 25 points and 10 rebounds in 26 minutes. The Sixers recently extended his minutes limit to 28, but that didn’t help them much on Friday as the Magic hit one 3-pointer after another.
Friday’s game was the third of Orlando’s nine-night, five-game road trip throughout America’s heartland. The Magic thumped San Antonio on Tuesday with some impressive play on both ends of the floor and it seemed to be in position to capture another victory on Thursday in Memphis before a collapse. Orlando plays next on Sunday in Detroit and it closes out the trip on Tuesday in Washington.
On Thursday, Orlando had an undermanned Memphis team in a 14-point hole with 6:12 to play and it seemed to be on its way to a second consecutive road victory. However, the Magic turned the ball over repeatedly down the stretch and lost 95-94 when Marc Gasol drilled two free throws with 12.2 seconds to play.
``It’s really important to be able to bounce back and in this league you have to do that because there are so many games,’’ Vucevic said. ``We did a good job tonight even though we came into town late. We were able to respond and we had great energy, especially at the start of the second half and that’s when we were able to put them away.’’
Up eight at intermission following a solid first half, Orlando broke the game open in the third quarter with runs of 10-0 and 19-6. That helped them grab a commanding 82-61 lead by the start of the fourth quarter.
The Magic’s shooting from the outside and ball movement were extraordinary in the third period. Orlando connected on 11 of 21 shots and six of nine 3-pointers thanks to ball movement that led to eight assists in the quarter.
Augustin, who was moved into the starting lineup so that the Magic could better take advantage of his shooting skills, go hot after halftime. He had three 3-pointers and two assists in the third quarter alone to spark the offense. Ibaka, Gordon and Fournier also had threes in the quarter, helping the Magic expand the lead up as high as 21. And in the fourth the advantage swelled to as much as 29 points – their largest advantage in any game all season.
``We go to our post a lot in our offense and those guys were unselfish, kicking it out and we were able to knock down shots,’’ Augustin said.
Orlando showed no ill effects of the Memphis meltdown from a night earlier, grabbing the lead and hanging onto it throughout a first half that it led 50-42 at the break. The Magic shot 45.2 percent in the first two quarters and drilled four 3-pointers. Their lead could have been much bigger had they not missed six of their 14 free throws early in the game.
Gordon, who has struggled with his shot all season, made the Philly defense pay early on for leaving him open with jump shots. Once he got into the flow, Gordon knocked down shots all over the floor for 15 first-half points. That nearly equaled his season high of 17 set in the second game in Detroit.
Like Augustin, Gordon felt that it was important that the Magic were given Friday morning off from their usual team meeting to allow time for the team to clear its head following the loss in Memphis. The trust shown paid off in a big way later Friday night when Orlando repeatedly gashed the Sixers with 3-point shots for another big road win.
``Panic is contagious,’’ Gordon opined. ``If your coach, your leader, is panicking, then it’s going to fall down to everybody else. … We didn’t like the feeling of last night’s game and we know that the ball stopped moving. We have good veterans on this team and we’re a high-IQ basketball team. The result is the way we played (on Friday).’’
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